The history and genealogy of Famine Irish orphans of 19th Century
Saint John, New Brunswick, get a huge boost with the release of Peter
Murphy's extraordinary and exciting new book.

Important data from previously unexplored primary records, constructs
family groups, gauges dimensions of overwhelming privations and
identifies more than 100 destitute Irish children farmed out to homes,
primarily in New Brunswick, with a few to Nova Scotia.

Of the more than 300 children who passed through the Emigrant Orphan
Asylum between 1847-1849, nearly half were placed in stranger's homes.
Of these nearly one-third ended up in farming communities along the
lower reaches of the St. John and Kennebecasis rivers. Another 30 per
cent were placed in Saint John.

No evidence surfaces of any effort by asylum administrators to keep
siblings together, much less place them in homes to nurture their
predominantly Roman Catholic heritage.

The fate of five Coyne children from Sligo (the origin of nearly half
of the asylum's population) "with barely sufficient rags upon their
persons to cover their nakedness" is one example of the hundreds of
heart-wrenching stories which unfold in Murphy's scholarly study.

Bryan Coyne, 16, was apprenticed to Christopher Harper in Shediac on
Nov. 20, 1847, three weeks after he disembarked with his family at the
port city. His mother was dead and his father was in hospital. Four
younger Coyne children, likely siblings of Bryan's, were scattered.
Andrew, 14, went with Jas Fowler to Hampton; Michael, 12, with William
Balcam to Annapolis and Lawrence, 10, with A. L. Palmer to Dorchester.

That left Bessie, who was four when admitted to the asylum, and six
when it closed, one of the seven left-over girls sent to the Alms House,
Nov. 8, 1849. The following spring, Bessie, then about age seven, went
to Annapolis with Dr. Leslie. (How fervently one wants to imagine that
little Bessie somehow became reunited with older brother Michael. This
book has the power to evoke such emotions.)

Murphy's research, annotations, bibliography and analytic text are
exacting and concise. This book is top shelf.